


Holding On and Letting Go

by Team_Two_Cats



Series: Suikovember 2020 [11]
Category: Suikoden Series (Video Games), Suikoden V
Genre: Angst, Long-Distance Relationship, M/M, Not exactly breaking up
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-27
Updated: 2020-11-27
Packaged: 2021-03-10 05:54:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27739486
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Team_Two_Cats/pseuds/Team_Two_Cats
Summary: Suikovember 2020 Day 27 Prompt: Broken HeartTen years after S5, Nick is very happy with his place in the Dragon Cavalry and his relationship with Yoran. But Yoran's just gotten a chance to follow his passion all the way to the Toran Republic to spend time studying the dragons--an opportunity he's not about to pass up, even if it means years apart from Nick. It has the potential to shatter the happiness Nick feels he has, but will it be enough to drive the two apart after all they've been through?
Relationships: Nick/Yoran (Suikoden)
Series: Suikovember 2020 [11]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2019115





	Holding On and Letting Go

“You should be happy for him,” Rahal says. “This is an opportunity that no one from Falena has had before. It’s…unprecedented, and it might mean entirely new possibilities for us. For the country. For the world.”

The Commander’s office isn’t small, but Nick feels the walls pressing in around him. He came here hoping that Rahal would stop this foolishness. But ten years as Commander was perhaps too long to understand what a breaking heart feels like. After all, Rahal let Roog move away to the capital, so that they only see each other every couple of months. Perhaps the man had forgotten entirely what love is.

“Then let me accompany him,” Nick says, drawing himself straight. “He will need a bodyguard. Ax and I should be—”

“There is no way that Milia or the Dragon Knights will allow a dragon horse into their domain. Things are still too fragile. Yoran will have the best protection. The queen has assigned Kyle himself to act as his guard and the official Falenan representative. He will be safe.”

“No offence, sir,” Nick says, “but he won’t be safe enough unless I’m with him.”

“Your duty is to the Dragon Cavalry and your dragon horse. To protecting the borders of Falena. That, above everything else, is what you need to concentrate on.”

“Easy for you to say,” Nick mutters, turning his head away.

Rahal is around the desk and directly in front of him in a flash, reminding Nick that while the Commander hasn’t been out in the field much recently, he’s still very much in shape, and still one of the deadliest fighters in the queendom.

“I will forgive your careless words this time,” Rahal hisses, “because I know very well how much it hurts to choose duty over...” He swallows. “…matters of the heart. But _I_ am not the one who agreed to travel to Toran to spend time with the dragons. _I_ am not the one who negotiated with the Dragon Knights who came to the queen’s wedding. So if you have a problem, it’s not with _me._ ”

Rahal snaps in front of Nick’s face, drawing his eyes back.

“But you _will_ have a problem with me if you try to follow Yoran. You will be declared a renegade and you will no longer have a home here. Am I understood?”

Nick’s lower lip trembles, but he stills it, nods. “Perfectly understood, sir.”

He turns crisply on his heel and walks swiftly out the door.

\---

Nick throws his pack onto the bed, starts throwing clothes into it. What does Rahal know anyway? Duty. There are some things that go beyond duty. To the Dragon Cavalry. To Falena. There are _people_ who deserve more loyalty than the ideas that Rahal professes to serve. If he has to be a renegade, then he will be a renegade. Fine.

A knock on his door stops him and Nick glances at the door, then to his pack. Maybe it’s Rahal, come to apologize, to change his mind. But no, that’s as impossible as the sun rising in the west. He throws a blanket over the pack and goes to answer the door.

Roog stands in the hallway, awkward smile on his face. “Hey, kid. Thought you might want someone to talk to.”

“I’m not in the mood,” Nick says, moving to close the door again, but the larger man puts his foot in the way, pushes forward into the room.

“Yeah, well, tough cookies,” Roog says. “I saw you storm out of Ral’s office. Thought you could use a fresh perspective before you do something…rash.”

Roog walks to the bed and flips the blanket off the pack, hums at the clothes spilling out, half packed. Nick pushes past him and grabs the pack, pushes the clothes fully inside.

“What I need is for Rahal to call off this stupid mission,” Nick says. “ _Years_. That’s how long he’ll be gone. Studying the dragons and their calls. Their social structures. Looking into the possibility of cross breeding. _Years_ , Roog.”

“Yeah, years,” Roog says. “It’s rough. But it’s also the way the world works. Sometimes things just happen. You have to make the choices that work best for you.”

“Well thanks,” Nick says. “That’s exactly what I’m doing.”

“Really?” Roog asks. “Because it looks to me like you’re being an ass about it all. But what do I know, right? Not like I’ve been in a situation a lot like this and—oh wait, yes I have.”

“The situation is nothing like you and Rahal,” Nick says. It isn’t. Rahal is…right here. And Roog is across the queendom most of the time, yes, but they can see each other occasionally, can… And anyway, Roog didn’t have to move away. He could have stayed, could have served directly under Rahal if he had wanted.

“Oh, and why is that?” Roog asks.

“You could have still been together,” Nick says.

Roog laughs. “Yeah, because that’s _exactly_ what I wanted, to be Rahal’s assistant. His boy toy on the side, able to suck him off on the job. Yup, exactly what I wanted.”

“You could have done _something!”_ Nick shouts.

Roog shakes his head. “I did do _something_ ,” he says. “I followed my own passion. My own ambition. Me and Rahal, we were always…rivals and lovers. Him being promoted…look, that wasn’t going to work. I was never going to accept just being second fiddle. I’d undermine his command. I’d make our issues into issues for the whole Cavalry. It would have wrecked not only the discipline of the organization, it would also have killed what me and Rahal had. It wasn’t going to work. So I found a better solution. One where I could be in charge of something. And yeah, it’s still under Rahal’s command, but it didn’t ruin what we have.”

“You only see each other once or twice a year,” Nick says.

“Yeah, and the sex is _amazing_ ,” Roog says, grinning.

Nick growls and throws more clothes in his pack. “Well this is going to be longer even than that. There’s not even any guarantee that Yoran’s coming back. He might _stay_. What then? I might never see him again.”

“If that’s the case, you’re kinda wasting the time you have with him right now, aren’t you?”

Nick feels his body stiffen, his blood running cold.

“Maybe instead of making all these big decisions for your relationship, you should be talking to the man who’s also making these decisions.”

Nick drops the shirt he was about to pack. He thinks about his last conversations with Yoran. He feels the tears welling in his eyes. Fuck. Roog’s actually not as dumb as he looks.

\---

He finds Yoran in the stables. Of course. With Ax. Yoran is playing the dragon flute and the dragon horse is vibing on the tune.

Nick just listens for a while. In ten years his own playing has gotten a lot better, but he’s still nowhere as good as Yoran. Part of the problem, really. That Yoran actually got the attention of the dragon visiting for the wedding. That he got so excited about the possibilities of the links between dragons and dragon horses.

“You know Ax won’t know what do if you go,” Nick says. “He’ll be heartbroken.”

Yoran stops. He looks at Ax, who trills at him. He smiles, pets the dragon horse’s neck.

“He’ll be fine as long as you keep up your practicing,” Yoran says. “You could always get more lessons from Rania, if nothing else works.”

“I much prefer _your_ teaching style,” Nick says.

Yoran chuckles. “I will miss playing for Ax. But I’ve told him what I’m doing. And why. I think he understands.”

“Good for him,” Nick says.

Yoran sighs. “I told you what I was doing, you know? Every step of the way. And you…encouraged me to pursue it. Told me that I shouldn’t be afraid to try and find the connections between the dragons and dragon horses.”

“I didn’t know it would mean you’d _leave me_ ,” Nick says. “I thought you’d, like, write letters to Futch. Maybe visit there for a short vacation. We could have gone together. I’d take you all the way to the border. We could ride Ax. Make an adventure of it!”

“This isn’t something that I can finish in a weekend,” Yoran says. “It’s not like I want to see the Great Tree of the Elves or, I don’t know, want to attend a play. Dragon flute music has been my passion. But…there really isn’t all that much I can do with it here. Yeah, I can experiment with different songs, trying to really get into how the communication works. But that’s work that dragon horse riders and musicians have been working on for centuries. This…is an opportunity to do something new. Something that no one else has done before.”

“I understand that, but—”

“Would you be content to quit the Dragon Cavalry and become a shopkeeper? Or a fisherman? You could still ride Ax for fun, when you weren’t working, but otherwise you wouldn’t be a dragon horse rider anymore. Would you be happy?”

Nick sucks in a breath, doesn’t let it out as he thinks. A moment ago he would have said he was ready to quite the Dragon Cavalry. That he would do anything. For Yoran. But that isn’t what Yoran is asking. He’s asking if he’d be happy. And that…

“No,” Nick says, finally letting it out. “No, I don’t think I’d be happy. I’ve spent my life becoming a dragon horse rider, rising through the ranks of the Dragon Cavalry. If I had to stop…I don’t think I’d be able to be happy, knowing what I’d given up. It would always be…a weight. On me. Regardless of what I was doing. Even if I still had Ax. Even if…I still had you.”

Yoran smiles and approaches, wraps his arms around Nick. They’ve both grown since they were younger but Nick shot up taller and wider. The top of Yoran’s head reaches about to Nick’s chin.

“I won’t stop loving you,” Yoran says. “And while it would be cruel to expect y—” His voice cracks and he pauses, starts again. “To expect you to wait so long for me, I’m not dying. I’ll write to you. I’ll visit when I can. I know that I’ll still need to travel back and forth, to study both the dragons and the dragon horses. I don’t have to stop being a part of your life, unless you want me to.”

Yoran looks up and Nick sees the tears there. Finally sees that this decision has been impossible for Yoran, too. And here’s he’s been a selfish jerk. Nick leans down and kisses Yoran on the forehead, then on the lips.

“Hey, none of that,” he says. “Of course I want you in my life. I…it just hurts. Like my heart is breaking.”

Yoran nods. “Mine too,” he says. “And I’m so sorry. But I need to do this. For me. For my happiness. I never want to resent you for missing my chance to do what I really want. Even…if that means being apart for a long time.”

Nick thinks of Rahal and Roog. How he never understood it before. And now…

Fuck.

He kisses Yoran again. Harder.

“How much time before you go?” he asks. All this time he’s been avoiding Yoran, and now it’s all time he could have been cherishing their closeness.

“Three days,” Yoran says.

Nick nods. “Then I hope they got a basket because neither one of us is going to be in a state to ride in a saddle by then.”

Yoran smiles, his face flushing, and they kiss again. The pain, that’s still there. Nick’s broken heart. But there’s something else, something even deeper and stronger, that is growing. A bond no distance can break. Nick looks around, whistles for Ax to stand watch, and pulls Yoran after him to a dry patch of hay, to stop wasting the time they have left near to each other.

**Author's Note:**

> I didn't really want to lean in entirely tragic directions with this prompt, so I decided to show an instance where Nick's heart is breaking. But that doesn't mean their relationship is over, or that they're actually breaking up. Here it just means that relationships are hard, especially when both parties are motivated and ambitious. Sometimes it means losing something you love in order to pursue something you need, and it's bittersweet, for all that I think they make the right call here.


End file.
